in the situation described by Maud. The two _amateurs_--
_connoisseurs_ would not be misapplied, either--had seated themselves
at the brink of a spring of delicious water, and removing the corn-cob
that Pliny the younger had felt it to be classical to affix to the
nozzle of a quart jug, had, some time before, commenced the delightful
recreation of sounding the depth, not of the spring, but of the vessel.
As respects the former, Mike, who was a wag in his way, had taken a
hint from a practice said to be common in Ireland, called "potatoe and
point," which means to eat the potatoe and point at the butter;
declaring that "rum and p'int" was every bit as entertaining as a
"p'int of rum." On this principle, then, with a broad grin on a face
that opened from ear to ear whenever he laughed, the county Leitrim-man
would gravely point his finger at the water, in a sort of mock-homage,
and follow up the movement with such a suck at the nozzle, as, aided by
the efforts of Nick, soon analyzed the upper half of the liquor that
had entered by that very passage. All this time, conversation did not
flag, and, as the parties grew warm, confidence increased, though
reason sensibly diminished. As a part of this discourse will have some
bearing on what is to follow, it may be in place to relate it, here.

"Ye're a jewel, ye be, _ould_ Nick, or _young_ Nick!" cried
Mike, in an ecstasy of friendship, just after he had completed his
first half-pint. "Ye're as wilcome at the Huts, as if ye owned thim,
and I love ye as I did my own brother, before I left the county
Leitrim--paice to his sowl!"

"He dead?" asked Nick, sententiously; for he had lived enough among the
pale-faces to have some notions of then theory about the soul.

"That's more than I know--but, living or dead, the man must have a